Two Prosecutors

Two Prosecutors

Year: 2025

Runtime: 117 mins

Language: Russian

Director: Sergei Loznitsa

Echo Score: 90
HistoryDrama

During Stalin’s Great Terror in 1937, a young prosecutor uncovers a desperate letter from a prisoner. The discovery leads him to question the established system and sparks his determination to challenge it. He must navigate a dangerous political landscape while seeking justice and confronting the pervasive corruption of the era.

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Timeline & Setting – Two Prosecutors (2025)

Explore the full timeline and setting of Two Prosecutors (2025). Follow every major event in chronological order and see how the environment shapes the story, characters, and dramatic tension.

Time period

1937

The action takes place in 1937, amid Stalin's Great Purge, a period defined by show trials, widespread arrests, and pervasive fear. The protagonist travels from Bryansk to Moscow, exposing the strain between individual conscience and state machinery. The narrative uses the changing settings to show how the regime's reach extends from provincial offices to the highest levels of government.

Location

Bryansk, Moscow, Smolny (Leningrad)

Bryansk serves as a provincial backdrop where a local prosecutor's office operates under NKVD oversight, illustrating how political repression reaches the courts. The city embodies the fear and coercion of the Great Purge. Moscow unfolds as the nexus of Procurator General's authority, where red tape and power dynamics shape Kornyev's mission. A reference to Smolny links the events to the revolutionary legacy that continues to govern dissent.

⚖️ Political 🧭 Repression

Last Updated: October 01, 2025 at 12:45

Main Characters – Two Prosecutors (2025)

Meet the key characters of Two Prosecutors (2025), with detailed profiles, motivations, and roles in the plot. Understand their emotional journeys and what they reveal about the film’s deeper themes.

Kornev (Aleksandr Kuznetsov)

A young Soviet prosecutor newly graduated from law school, he arrives with a belief in truth and due process. He challenges local NKVD influence by pursuing Stepniak's letter, risking reprisal in a climate of fear. His idealism is tested as he travels from Bryansk to Moscow and confronts a bureaucracy that may not want to hear the truth.

⚖️ Protagonist 🧭 Bureaucracy

Stepniak (Aleksandr Filippenko)

An imprisoned Old Bolshevik who bears the scars of repression and pleads with Kornyev to expose wrongful convictions. He frames his past as loyalty to Bolshevism and urges action from the top levels of power. His call for truth underscores the moral stakes of the protagonist's mission.

🕊️ Old Bolshevik 🎗️ Witness

Prison Governor (Vytautas Kaniušonis)

A prison administrator who embodies the local machinery of control, surveillance, and gatekeeping within the system. He represents the enforcement side of state power in the Bryansk facility and the broader repression he helps sustain.

🏛️ Authority 🗝️ Gatekeeper

The Deputy (Andris Keiš)

A pragmatic prison official who operates within the bureaucracy, often balancing procedural concerns with the regime's expectations. He reflects the everyday complicity and slow-moving nature of state power.

🏢 Bureaucracy 🗂️ Office

Chatterbox (Valentin Novopolskij)

A talkative passenger who sits with Kornyev on the train and shares stories that echo the regime's memories of Lenin and Soviet glory. His chatter illustrates how memory and propaganda persist even in tense political climates.

💬 Talkative 📜 Storytelling

The Man with the Wooden Leg (Valentin Novopolskij)

A peglegged WWI veteran who recounts visiting Lenin in Smolny, embodying the era's lingering revolutionary nostalgia and the personal myths that politics often uses to justify control.

🗨️ Veteran 🎙️ Storyteller

Old Prisoner (Ivgeny Terletsky)

An elderly inmate whose presence underscores the human cost of political repression and the prison's memory. His perspective adds a somber note about the consequences of the purge.

🧓 Elderly 🧠 Memory

Corridor Warder (Orests Paško)

A prison warder who polices the corridors and enforces the routine of confinement. He represents the routine surveillance that sustains the state's hold on people.

🚪 Guard 🔒 Security

Last Updated: October 01, 2025 at 12:45

Major Themes – Two Prosecutors (2025)

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⚖️ Justice vs Power

The film pits the idea of the rule of law against an omnipresent state apparatus. Stepniak's letter and Kornyev's inquiry test whether wrongful convictions can be challenged within a system aimed at loyalty to the NKVD. The tension reveals the fragility of evidence-driven justice when political fear overrides truth.

🕯️ Truth-Telling

Kornyev is drawn to truth through Stepniak's testimony and the prisoner’s painful history of torture, but he must weigh personal risk against public exposure. The characters insist on telling Stalin or the Politburo about corruption, yet face silence or bureaucracy. The film explores the moral weight of bearing witness in an era of censorship.

🧭 Bureaucracy

The story exposes the labyrinth of Soviet bureaucracy, where paperwork, offices, and officials assess danger through procedural filters. Kornyev must navigate delays, officers’ loyalties, and a system that resists independent inquiry without solid documents. The journey from Bryansk to Moscow highlights how red tape can shield or impede justice.

Last Updated: October 01, 2025 at 12:45

Unlock the Full Story of Two Prosecutors

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Two Prosecutors Summary

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Two Prosecutors Summary

Two Prosecutors Timeline

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Two Prosecutors Timeline

Two Prosecutors Spoiler-Free Summary

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Two Prosecutors Spoiler-Free Summary

More About Two Prosecutors

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